In the latest development in the topsy-turvy world of Marshall Islands politics, the current government of Friday named former Ambassador Banny deBrum to fill a post that has been vacant for almost two years.
The U.S. is this western Pacific nation’s most important ally, providing more than 60 percent of its annual budget of $137 million.
“Filling the vacancy in Washington is a top priority,” said Foreign Minister John Silk, who introduced a resolution to the parliament Friday to confirm deBrum, who held the Washington post for 12 years until a change of government in January 2008 saw his ouster. The appointment is with a parliamenet committee and approval is expected before the end of September.
The return of members of the former government to President Litokwa Tomeing’s administration, which staved off a vote of no confidence in April from government senators who had dumped deBrum, paved the way for the former ambassador’s reappointment.
“The consequence of not having an ambassador limits Marshall Islands from pursuing matters of its own interest,” said a State Department official commenting on the long-term vacancy.
This close American ally has never gone more than a few months without an ambassador in Washington since a Compact of Free Association came into effect between the two countries in 1986.
The resolution follows the Tomeing administration’s announcement in May of its plan to get deBrum back into the D.C. job where he was one of the most senior Pacific island diplomats.
In the absence of a Marshall Islands ambassador, multi-billion dollar nuclear test compensation claims and a dispute over future American use of an important missile testing range in the Marshall Islands have languished.
“Filling this key post will “enable the government to deal with a number of outstanding issues that have imminent deadlines with the government of the United States of America,” Silk said.
One of those is a petition filed to the U.S. Congress in 2000 seeking more than $2 billion in compensation and radiation clean up funding from the U.S. for damage from 67 nuclear tests conducted at Bikini and Enewetak. The Compact agreement between the two countries allows the Marshall Islands to petition the Congress for nuclear test compensation but does not obligate the U.S. to provide money.
